Records Management in a Federal Service Oriented Environment

Dr. Michael J. Kurtz, Assistant Archivist for Records Services, Washington DC, National Archives and Records Administration, presented an interesting case study at the SOA Consortium’s September meeting in Orlando on establishing Records Management in a Federal Service Oriented Environment.

In an era of electronic war fighting, homeland security and expanding reach of the federal government, the need to share information is vital. Currently, the 300-plus federal agencies each have their own records management program, all with varying degrees of maturity. The NARA initiative is tasked with finding efficient and effective ways to manage and share information, and help federal agencies transfer their permanently valuable electronic records to the National Archives.

At the core of the multi-agency initiative was the definition of common records management services for use across all federal government agencies. Dr. Kurtz spoke of the challenges defining technology independent records management services that have the proper precision, yet are pliable for future requirements. Keys to the 18-agency community of practice’s success were requirements elicitation through modeling, model-driven architecture (MDA) techniques and creating uniform semantics.

In addition to the service definitions, the team is evaluating a proposed Records Management Maturity Model (RM3). The hope is that agencies could use this model, if adopted, to assess their current business processes, tools and techniques to manage records and create transition plans. Dr. Kurtz pointed out that the records management services and maturity models are not necessarily government specific and therefore are applicable to all industries.

Throughout the presentation, Dr. Kurtz engaged in Q&A with meeting attendees on cross-agency information sharing, funding models, MDA model formats and organizational change.

Presentation Abstract
A multi-agency Records Management Service initiative has been undertaken by an Interagency Project Team composed of nineteen Federal Agencies under the leadership of the National Archives and Records Administration. The service is being developed in the context of the US Federal Government's over-arching approach to move to Service Oriented Architecture in the Enterprise Architecture of its agencies. This presentation provides an overview of the activities of a government Community of Practice defining and enabling a Records Management Service in order to realize the vision of Service Oriented Architecture in Federal Government.
 

About the Speaker:

Dr. Michael Kurtz currently serves as the Assistant Archivist for Records Services, Washington DC, National Archives and Record Administration. He joined the National Archives and Records Administration in 1974 and has worked in a variety of archival and management positions in major components of the Agency. Kurtz is also an adjunct professor at the University of Maryland's College of Library and Information Services, focusing on the management of cultural institutions.

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